Did the head tilt and flopped ear get diagnosed as an infection or…? The only two things I can think of are an ear infection and E. Culi for this particular symptom.

Does she have any discharge coming from her nose? Perhaps you could try taking a video when she’s breathing funny and show it to the vet.

I think it’s always good to have a blood test as long as that’s a viable option. A blood test doesn’t really affect bunnies so it should be fine.

It’s quite concerning that she isn’t eating hay and veggies anymore though. If you aren’t already, you may want to feed her some critical care in the meantime to make sure her digestive tract stays normal.

Hi, Im sorry you’re going through this.
I suggest you try and find a different rabbit savvy vet as any vet would see this as an emergency as if she is not eating normally, her gi tract could be going into stasis. Is she on any pain meds because I would assume she is in pain from her eye which would cause her to not want to eat. Also, if she isn’t eating too many veggies, she may be dehydrated and the vet should give you a bag of fluids to give at home.
I agree with Kurottabun, she probably needs a CBC and chemistry test to make sure everything is okay and then if she has an infection, the white blood cells would be either elevated or lowered depending on how infected she is. Also some fecal or other testing could rule out EC and other illnesses.

If I’m not mistaken, Revolution is more often used to treat parasitical issues like mites, fleas etc. I’m not sure if mites can cause a head tilt though – some sites say it can but only in very severe cases. However mites left untreated can lead to an ear infection, and if she has an infection the vet would normally prescribe some sort of antibiotic. You mentioned that she IS on antibiotics though – do you mean Flazol? And were you referring to penicillin shots as the medicine given by injection?

I think the most common antibiotics prescribed for bunnies are Flagyl (Metronidazole – which is the same active ingredient as Flazol), Baytril (Enrofloxacin) and penicillin shots.

Is her head still tilting? Monday next week sounds like quite a lot of days to wait if she’s not improving. You could definitely ask for a blood test first while waiting for the ultrasound. The last time my bunny did a blood test, they managed to get the results in about 15-20 minutes so it shouldn’t take too long. Either that or you could request pushing the ultrasound forward to sometime this week instead?

If she’s not eating and drinking as much as she should, you may need to force feed her Critical Care and water with a syringe to make sure her gut continues moving to avoid the dreaded GI stasis on top of all the current issues.

Sending recovery vibes for Hazel and hoping she gets the appropriate treatment soon xx

I know it’s scary anytime a bun goes under. My girl had a horrible tooth root abscess but it was one her bottom jaw. Make sure the vet only takes out the bad teeth as taking out healthy ones can cause fractures in the tooth root and cause the tooth to grow back. If you take healthy ones out, it can cause a break to the jaw bone and of course, more issues to deal with.And as long as the bad teeth are delt with, Then hopefully you can just go in for trims every 6 months of so. It’s sucks how fragile these animals are but keep hope and make sure the vet knows the proper anesthesia for buns as they can’t be put under like dogs and cats. Ask very detailed questions to the vet and make sure you feel comfortable with him. How many teeth are going to be taken out?
Good luck and keep us updated!

I’m pretty sure bunnies have around 20 teeth total. He should only be removing the top bad teeth. If he removes healthy ones and the bottom opposing teeth he is risking her health and life, with that many teeth gone I would be concerned of too much bleeding and pain that would cause her to go into shock when waking up. it can crack the jaw and cause abscesses since their teeth are firmly in the jaw compared to dogs and cats. He should only be removing the teeth that are causing the issues not extras just because. It’s concerijg he wants to remove all her right check teeth. My girl only had her bad teeth removed and which will mean biannual trims. So she does have bottom teeth with opposing top ones gone but not all should be gone. That will cause eating issues for her and her to possibly choke when she eats food and her other side of her mouth will get worn darn far too fast to where the teeth will get worn down to the root and cause her to not want to eat. Ask him if he will not be aggressive and only take out the ones causing an issue.

I hope I didn’t scare you but there are major risks with how aggressive he is

It sounds a bit drastic to me, removing so many teeth. I’m not sure I quite understand what teeth he’ll be pulling. All inner teeth on one side, both upper and lower jaw? Extraction of healthy teeth or teeth that are not loosened by periodontal disease seems very difficult and isn’t recommended. Please read this:
http://rabbit.org/dental-disorders-in-rabbits/
I’m asking another FL about this right now, hopefully she knows better than I do.

Parasite traveling to the brain would be E cuniculi, a microsporidian parasite classified as a fungus. It’s treatable with fenbendazole (dewormer). Most rabbits are thought to have been exposed to this parasite, and it can lie dormant for many years or the whole life of the rabbit, but it is opportunistic and if a rabbit is weakened from another illness, it can “awaken” and start causing trouble.

Mites could cause itching and irritation. The injectable you couldn’t remember the name of earlier was probably ivermectin. There are no other bunny safe antiparasitics that will kill mites. Fipronil kills rabbits. Permethrin is tolerated by many rabbits, but adverse reactions have occurred and Medirabbit doesn’t consider it bunny safe.

Pasteurella is sth I’d look into, it’s very common and can cause a whole host of issues and most strains seem resistant to metronidazole,

Penicillin must only ever be given in injections to rabbits, never orally.

Here is a good article on pasteurella in rabbits. I must warn you though, it is rather scary and it has some graphic pictures, so only open it if you feel up to it:
http://www.lbah.com/word/rabbit/pasteurella-rabbit/

If you’re looking for good info on rabbit health, Medirabbit and the House Rabbit Society are trusted sources.

I don’t think I’d have her teeth pulled quite yet, but that’s of course just my personal feeling. Is Baytril absolutely out of the question?

I don’t have anything to add to what’s already been said, but would just like to send you some positive vibes for this ordeal. It sounds like you’re doing your very best already xx

I sympathize with your feelings of frustration. It’s so very difficult when you can’t make sense of symptoms and you don’t have a really rabbit savvy vet to consult. Unfortunately, there are still way too few really rabbit savvy vets in this world.

I think it’s very wise of you to not have her inner teeth extracted. I read back in your history, about how she had white snot in June and that could be a more likely cause of her problems. Her incisor problem was some time ago, so it seems like that problem would have manifested in eating difficulties sooner if this was related. That she’s reluctant to eat could be because it causes her pain in the structures around the eye/the eye itself when she chews. There could be additional swelling in her face that makes chewing painful. It sounds like a very good plan to try and get enrofloxacine from someplace else. She would probably need rather a long course of enrofloxacine. She might also benefit from meloxicam, a bunny-safe anti inflammatory and painkiller. It could help with swelling due to inflamed tissues and it would give her some pain relief as well.

We are not vets here and interpreting x-rays is difficult. Me and the other forum leader that have looked at them cant see anything very obvious though. You could perhaps ask the vet to send the pix out for a second opinion.

I know what it’s like having so many vets say different things. I’ve learned if you found the best you can, you have to be very forceful in some situations and be your bunnies advocate because the doctor won’t be. You now have all this information you can take to him and say what you think. Often times one thing is tied to another in a bunny so you can treat them all individually or treat one issue and usually it will improve the other symptoms and then you can combat those after the major issue is found and delt with, almost like stasis. Stasis is underlying and just treating it won’t help the bun, you have to find what’s causing this. If you get on antibiotics , make sure you’re on pro and prebiotics so she doesn’t go into stasis like mine did.
Caramel was on pen-g shots for a whole year and it didn’t affect her but she was also on pre and probiotics but each buns can act differently to each drug.
I know a CT costs a lot but I know X-rays won’t show the whole picture if something else is going on. Would you have the ability to get her a ct done and it can show everything going on with her head like: ear infection, detailed tooth issues(how deep it is or widespread) and other like eye issues? I know caramel had them when she had her abscess and it really can show how deep it went which helps for surgery.

One of my other buns is going in for a checkup and I’ll ask my vet what she thinks of your situation. And looking at the X-rays the second one- the top teeth look like they are going pretty far into the eye cavity and the right side of her face isn’t a clear picture so I can’t tell how far up they are but lookin. At the left it looks like her roots are pretty high up so I wouldn’t be surprised if her right are the same.

Personally I think you have a tooth root problem, that is leading to an eye infection which you have to be careful of because you don’t want the bacteria to get into the rest of her body and cause sepsis but getting on antibiotics will prevent that and it also depends on what bacteria it is so you can use the right meds to kill it. And then meloxicam will help inflammation( but only a week or so dose because it is hard on the liver or kidneys) and then entyce will keep her wanting to eat. Maybe a warm compress can help get the gunk out from her eye and cause her some relief and reduce swelling for the mean time. Do you have a vet school near you? Or maybe some wildlife center with veterinarians? Maybe they can look at your X-rays and see what they think. But I’ll see if my vet can say what she thinks

Okay i relooked at the xrays and it seems like the right side roots are really in her eye cavity so the last four check teeth would need to be removed but I’ll ask my vet

This thread was one of those that lost answers due to the recent tech problems. I had posted a link to a thread that Forumleader Jerseygirl recalled, about CT head scan to asses extent of damage to teeth roots and surrounding structures:
https://binkybunny.com/FORUM/tabid/54/aft/162945/Default.aspx#162945

We also discussed probiotics to strengthen the tummy if a variety of antibiotics need to be tried to find one that has effect against this particular infection. Nara mk reported that Hazel has been on Benebac from the start of all this, and that she prefers her veg with Benbac on them ?

I also responded saying Wooly has lived with this issue for many years and he is just a special needs bun. No abscess. And the vet never suggested pulling any teeth.

And I said a lot but mostly that the four teeth that are in her eye cavity need to be removed and she needs to be on Pen-g( with florentero or bennebac pro and probiotics during and after the antibiotics so her gut flora doesn’t get killed) Leaving the teeth in could cause chronic eye and teeth pain for her and lead to not eating and stasis, but like LBJ10 said, she could be fine but often times it turns into an abscess since bunnies that have “foreign” objects or just stuff their body doesn’t like it will form that to push it outside of the body so pen-g will help with that. Make sure the whole tooth root is pulled or else it ill grow back like my girl’s did. I go back to the vet on friday and I will ask her and see what she says unless you find out different news.